Musician Saul Conrad defies genre

Saul Conrad seems to defy genre. He sings lyrics that can be mysterious yet difficult to forget, while his melodies and harmonies range from melancholy to purely infectious.

The way he puts it, music can arise from ephemeral places deep within his mind.

“I can make unique chord structures and harmonic shapes that emerge from the haze of my aesthetic desire for a certain kind of music,” said Conrad.

His third studio release, “a tyrant and lamb,” recorded in his apartment in Jamaica Plain, Mass., is an eclectic collection of 10 catchy songs.

Conrad said his melodies “come down to dance in the bed of harmony, taking control and inverting the action, or modifying and translating it in other ways, or only adding a faint glow to what already exists.”

Inspired as much by Mozart as by the indie sensibilities of Chicago-based Joan of Arc, Conrad said he hopes his listeners come away from his music knowing a little more about themselves.

His energetic songs, which audiences will get to see at the Black Sparrow on Monday, will “bring [the audience] somewhere inside themselves they maybe haven't been before,” he said.